On Life, Faith, Love and Whatever else catches my fancy!

Oral Tradition and Fables, They say Moses was a Stammerer… Really?? Read and Judge!

We have had all heard the phrase – Heaven helps those who help themselves and cleanliness is next to godliness and as we have come to understand that these ‘scriptures’ are far from scriptural we have relegated them to the category that they belong to, which is that of moral sayings. However, over the past few years with the establishment of of the clergy and laity, and the advent of ‘Super-pastors’ and ‘Mega-men of God’ we have ventured into the dangerous waters of oral tradition replacing actual study of, and personal revelation from The Word. What do I mean? Please read on…

I recently had a conversation with a dear sister of mine during which she shared with me a message that had blessed her. The message had been preached by a respected bible teacher and initially I flowed along with what she was saying that the gentleman had shared from scriptures, but I very soon started shaking my head saying “no, that’s not the way I read it” and even though the gross misrepresentation of scriptures struck a raw nerve with me, I managed to hold my peace and still glean some things from what she shared with me. A while later she called me up and said Mettabel I went back to the scriptures and I checked out what you said, and oh my! That preacher misrepresented scripture… The facts were wrong!’ She then went on to expantiate on what she hadlearned from HER study of the scripture and I was thoroughly blessed by the exchange. Please do not get me wrong, I am not against listening to messages per se, but we Christians have gotten into the lazy habit of not searching the scriptures to see if it is so, like the Berean Jews did… We should swallow everything hook line and sinker with a large dose of ‘Amen!’ thrown in ‘Can I hear somebody’!

I will illustrate my point with a much quoted, most misunderstood assumption that Moses was a stammerer… I was thinking about this fact one day when I heard the Holy spirit say to me ‘don’t you think that Moses being a stammerer has got to be the most unlikely statement to make about him’? (He actually said this in plainer terms, but I’ll shield you all from what He actually said to me…) ‘Well, he was wasn’t he? Or was he? Not’? ‘Ah, let me explain’ He said to me and he went on to explain that Moses was in line to be Pharaoh and would have been regarded as a ‘demi-god’ as of the time he fled Egypt. Because of this fact, Moses would have been rigorously tutored in statesmanship, elocution, public speaking, and would have been skilled in all manner of public conduct from an early age usually as young as age eight, as they may be required to start ruling as pharaoh at anytime (The youngest pharaoh was Pepi II – He ascended to the throne at the age of six after his father died)

*On Egyptian Pharaohs:

Pharaohoriginally meant Egyptian “great house.” The name Pharaoh was not applied to the Egyptian ruler, until the days of the Israelite occupation in Egypt. The ancient Egyptians originally used the term Pharaoh as a name for the palace of their king. But the Israelites, and later the Nubians, etc. began to call the Egyptian ruler-Pharaoh. This was during the 18th Dynasty (1550-1307 bc) it was applied by extension to the king himself. The pharaoh was the religious, civil, and military leader of Egypt. The living pharaoh was associated with the god Horus.

Pharaohs became rulers through birth- they were sometimes born into positions, but usually it was assigned through a strategic system of governance and selection.

**Oahspereveals that when the Egyptian court pressured Pharaoh to remove Moses from his position (which would have placed in line to inherit the Egyptian throne after Pharaoh), his conscience led him to become actively concerned about the Israelites and their unfortunate conditions as slaves under the Egyptians. He spent 4 months investigating the conditions of the Israelites.Oahspe, Book of the Arc of Bon. 27/15.21.

So to assume that Moses was a stammerer I believe, may be an error of interpretation as handed down by yep! ORAL TRADITION… So what does the scripture really say?

The Bible states in the book of ◄ Exodus 6:30 ►

… And Moses said before the LORD, Behold, I am of uncircumcised lips, and how shall Pharaoh hearken unto me?King James Bible

Hmm really? Uncircumcised, not stammering but uncircumcised or unlearned…

But then the bible also says:

◄ Exodus 4:10 ►

And Moses said unto the LORD, O my Lord, I am not eloquent, neither heretofore, nor since thou hast spoken unto thy servant: but I am slow of speech, and of a slow tongue.

Is this not a contradiction?

Actually not,because according to the Hebrew lexicon, ‘heretofore’ in that statement actually pointed to a more recent past, and is painted from the picture of a man who was once considered one of the most powerful men on earth, now being asked to go back and confront his nemesis, from the stance of a lowly shepherd…

◄ Exodus 4:10 ► JBKAnd Moshe said to the LORD, O my LORD, I am not an eloquent man, neither yesterday nor the day before, nor since thou hast spoken to thy servant: but I am slow of speech, and of a slow tongue.

If you or I were in Moses’ shoes would we also boast of eloquence?

So my understanding is that Moses could have actually been saying – In my uncircumcised life I knew what to say, how to say it and when to say it… But this is an entirely new ball game… I don’t know how to do this ‘I AM said so, so and so’ thing… And I am no longer one of them, I don’t speak their language… I can’t go back!!!

I came away from this interchange with The Holy spirit questioning why I had unquestioningly accepted the fact that Moses was a stammerer? It was because I had never really STUDIED the scriptures for myself! This was so new to me…

So fine I was convinced that Moses was not a stammerer, by what I had read and what the Holy Spirit taught me… But where was the proof? Well, one day I was listening to my audio Bible when I heard something that made me jump up from the bed… This was it! This was the proof that Moses was not a stammerer… Holy Spirit was right! Duh???

This was the scripture I heard:

Acts 7: 22 in the King James Version is part of a quote of Stephen in regard to Moses. It reads as follows:

“And Moses was learned in all the wisdom of the Egyptians, and was mighty in words and deeds.”

What?! I thought he was a stammerer??? Apparently not!

HE WAS MIGHTY IN WORDS AND DEEDS!

In the New Century Version, it reads as follows: “The Egyptians taught Moses everything they knew, and he was a powerful man in what he said and did.”

Here is an interesting write-up I came across:

***The Speech Problem of Moses

There are two points of interest in Exodus 4: 10. The minor of the two comes at the beginning of the response in which Moses expresses his feelings of his calling of God. The various versions range from the informal to the formal in an interesting fashion. The major of the two comes at the end of his comment in expressing why he feels that he cannot accept his calling.

Examine what Moses said, according to the translators, and try to determine what his speech problem was. After presenting the various renderings of this verse, I shall present an alternate interpretation in a commentary:The different versions indicate that Moses had a physical handicap in speaking, or at least a fear of speaking to a group. Thus, Yahweh appointed Aaron to be the spokesman for Moses. Is this really what the problem was, or could there have been a different one? I shall present an alternative for my reader to consider.

Now think of Moses in his situation. The people were not ready to accept him. Also, he had to facean uncooperative pharaoh. His speech impediment most likely was that he did not know the language, but his brother would. He probably also had difficulty in communicating with Aaron at first. During the forty years in the wilderness, Moses seemed to have no physical handicap in talking to the people. As a highly educated man, he would have been able to learn the language, despite his advanced age.

Was it that Moses stuttered and feared to speak to anyone publicly or did he have a problem in being thrust into a language environment that he did not know? Weigh the evidence and make your own decision.

This is exactly what I am trying to accomplish by the writing of this article – The fact that God wants us to STUDY The Word this is what pleases him, what gives US understanding…

Timothy said to us:

◄ 2 Timothy 2:15 ►Study to shew thyself approved unto God, a workman that needeth not to be ashamed, rightly dividing the word of truth.

Yes, oral tradition may be great for the passing on of tales and fables from generation to generation, but inheritances only come by the reading of The Will…

Oral tradition: Information passed down through the generations by word of mouth that is not written down. This includes historical and cultural traditions, literature and law.

A Fable: A short tale that is narrated to teach a moral lesson, often with animals or inanimate objects as characters; apologue: the fable of the tortoise and the hare; Aesop’s fables; A story not founded on fact: This biography is largely a self-laudatory fable.

A Will: A legal document in which a person states who should receive his or her possessions after he or she dies